


Daemon Haunted World - Codas

by GleGeal



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Community: sparktober, F/M, Fix-It of Sorts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2020-10-15
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:27:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26794354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GleGeal/pseuds/GleGeal
Summary: Elizabeth once said her daemon Dreoides could change into fantastical creatures as well as natural ones...Three short stories set post-"The Daemon Haunted World", where Dreo gets to show off a little...Sequel to "The Daemon Haunted World" so won't make much sense if you haven't read that one.
Relationships: John Sheppard/Elizabeth Weir
Kudos: 9





	1. From the Ashes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John works through some issues regarding Asuras and his guilt over what happened.

John dropped into the pilot’s chair of the Jumper with a heavy thud and only ingrained military professionalism kept him from sprawling like a sack of potatoes and calling it a day already.  
The mission was already going badly and they hadn’t left the Jumper bay yet. 

In the last months since the city had arrived back to Earth, Atlantis had been moved into orbit at the Lagrange point on the far side of the Moon and was now functioning as the outer defense perimeter of Home World Security. Elizabeth had negotiated tirelessly for four months on behalf of their Pegasus allies but the hard truth was that Earth, and the US in particular, had paid a heavy toll in the last decade to keep their home planet safe, and the IOA wouldn’t be swayed into losing Atlantis’ defenses, even by the illustrious Dr. Weir. 

And so they’d be reduced to sentry duty, with the occasional mission for Elizabeth to renegotiate treaties among the many troublesome factions in the Milky Way. 

The four of them had discussed their situation endlessly, weighing the pros and cons, until finally Dreo had admitted what the other three wouldn’t say: Atlantis was needed by Earth and its people, selfish as it was to take the city from Pegasus. It had first belonged on Earth, and as the peoples of Pegasus couldn’t operate it without their help, it wasn’t much use to them there anyway. And if that trial had been anything to go by, they weren’t too happy about how the Tauri had been upsetting every Pegasus apple cart they’d stumbled across. 

Baeldor was still unhappy with him though and had been giving him the cold shoulder. He’d forgiven Dreo instantly of course, and had pardoned Elizabeth of all wrong doing in the matter. They had tried their best, and Elizabeth was still recovering from her ordeal with the damn nanites. It was John who hadn’t finished what they’d started: hadn’t eliminated the Wraith threat. The sense of failure weighed him down. Along with guilt. Because they were secretly relieved that they were free of that galaxy and all the horrors it had visited upon them. 

Elizabeth, ever the diplomat, had sought a compromise: The SGC would monitor the situation in Pegasus, keeping tabs on their allies and the Ancient magical eight ball device, with the intention of one day returning and establishing a permanent outpost or colony in the galaxy. 

The Daedalus had left six weeks ago with Teyla and Ronan aboard. They had both chosen to return to their home galaxy rather than remain on Earth when it became clear that the City wouldn’t be returning for at least a few years. 

The decision had been a painful one for both of them. Teyla had been overwhelmed by the opportunities Earth provided, but she had missed her people and her place among them. She’d felt guilty for living in relative safety while abandoning them to their fate, especially after all Michael had put them through. Being confined to Atlantis or forced to lie about her entire life to anyone outside the SGC hadn’t helped matters either. She had returned home with Kanaan and Torren, and would act as the Tauri’s principal liaison in Pegasus.  
Ronan had been torn between staying with Amelia or supporting Teyla and the rest of Pegasus. Having finally taken the fight to the Wraith, he had wanted to win more than he wanted the quiet life on Earth. As with Teyla, being a ‘guest’ of the SGC and the endless deceit had decided him. 

John had organized the farewell party, promised to keep up the fight to bring Atlantis back, seen them off on the Daedalus, and then moved on with his life. Baeldor had lasted only until Lizabeth and Dreo had left the party and then had followed their girls. 

The truth was his team had fractured on Asuras: Baeldor had never truly gotten over them not coming to their rescue and couldn’t forgive them for abandoning them during the attack on the replicator home world. While John was pragmatic about how everyone had treated him while Baeldor was gone - it was only natural after all - he could admit to his returned daemon that it had created an emotional distance that had never quite been bridged. 

Rodney had been reassigned to Area 51 temporarily and was shuttling back and forth between the City and the research facility there, working on improving their defensive capabilities and reverse engineering the City’s wormhole drive. Since the beginning of the expedition it’d been the three of them and their daemons, like Kirk Spock and McCoy, running the City. He knew Rodney felt guilty about the nanites and had missed Elizabeth too in his own gruff and childish way. John would be eternally grateful that Elizabeth and Dreo were still with them.  
He knew he’d mostly patched things up with Elizabeth, who had laughed off his occasional faux pas with Teyla over tea. But John was there when the nightmares woke her screaming and he had to reassure her that the world she’d awoken to was real. He knew she still second guessed everyones intentions and motivations, even if she insisted everything was fine and she trusted them all implicitly as she once had. 

And John felt guilty about all of it. It had strained his relationship with Rodney and the others. Even if he knew intellectually that it wasn’t Rodney’s fault, it was all too easy to pass on some of the guilt and blame to him. 

John sighed deeply and slouched further into his chair. Elizabeth was still annoyed with Gen. O’Neill over the specifics of the diplomatic milk run they were being sent on. He could sense her beginning to lose her patience with him, something that she’d not used to do, because Baeldor was cuddling up to her trying to soothe her. Dreo was furious about some aspect of it all and John could feel her ire echoing through Baeldor’s connection to them both. 

Just another one of the new and very weird things their daemons could now do. 

Like turning on and off their humans’ physical reactions to their touch. If Baeldor wished he could curl up on Lizabeth’s lap and all John would feel was a deep sense of comfort and calm. And for that again he could merely brush against her hand and stars would explode behind his eyes. Naturally, Baeldor enjoyed flicking that particular switch at the least opportune moments he could find. Poor Lorne was probably scarred for life…  
Dreo was, according to Lizabeth, much more ladylike about the whole thing. Dreo herself had explained that it was because they were deeply private and still affected by the whole nanite experience; they hated the idea of anyone but John or Baeldor seeing them like that. 

Another neat trick was that ever since they’d gotten back, Dreo had been able to separate from Lizabeth perhaps 50ft without it killing them, and so long as she remained with Baeldor the distance didn’t seem to matter. And, they’d lately discovered, this worked with John as well. 

So of course, they’d decided to try a daemon swap. 

They’d discovered on their last off world trip, to ratify their latest treaty with the Tolan, that they could spend whole days switched. It was the first time in John’s life that people hadn’t stared at his daemon unconsciously trying to work out what was odd about him or withdrawn once they heard him speak. It was the first time he’d truly fit in. It was bizarre. Weird even. He’d been hoping to convince Lizabeth and Dreo to try it again on this mission. Not that he didn’t love Baeldor, but he seemed quite happy to abandon him for Lizabeth, who’d had to contend with a settled daemon for once. 

But Lizabeth and Dreo were worried they wouldn’t be able to effectively charm the Ansari governors. They were renowned for their ready supply of naquadria and tempers that were just about as volatile.  
General O’Neill was expecting Elizabeth to perform miracles and get them to agree to exclusively supply the SGC with their processed ore in exchange for minimally useful technology and supplies, and protection from the recent Ori incursions into the Milky Way. She was worried that they’d be insulted and take their supply to a more appreciative customer, and was leveraging for more to sweeten the deal and show the Ansari that they could be trusted. But supplies had been strained and they needed allies desperately to counter the next wave of Ori attacks. 

John had just begun to inventory the Jumper’s equipment for something to kill time when he felt Baeldor heading his way.

// Lizabeth and Dreo are packing up. All done, they got us some extra stuff to bargain with. //

\\\ Let’s hope its enough! \\\

~

It definitely hadn’t been enough. 

John swung around to fire his P-90 at the pursuing Ansari military team. They had requested a minimal military presence for ‘their safety’, so John had brought only four marines along for the ride and two of them had remained with the Jumper. Which was currently about 300m ahead in a clearing just in front of the gate. 

He should have called this sooner. The Ansari had seemed pleasant enough at first, just their usual blunt selves. They’d seemed willing to negotiate and had given them a good welcome.  
But Elizabeth had been wary - Dreo had hummed to Baeldor that something seemed off about their behavior - they just didn’t seem pressured enough about signing the deal, like they no longer really cared. But they were nervous about something. 

Turned out that something was the Ori Prior who’d arrived a few days before them to enlighten them about the Path of Origin.. So far John had been lucky and hadn’t run into any of the new wave of Priors who’d been quietly infiltrating the Milky Way and attempting to sway some of key players away from alliances with Earth. The Prior had been only too delighted to brand them as heretics and condemn them to eternal fire for denouncing the faith. Two of Atlantis’ command staff would be a serious prize and the Prior had insisted his new followers show their allegiance. 

They had been arrested and lead to a holding cell to await an official presentation to the Prior as a gift from the newly loyal Ansari. There daemons had been confined in smaller cages alongside their own. Which was smart of the Ansari, John had to admit. They just hadn't counted on Dreo. The Atlantis team had waited until dusk, when the guards had relaxed a bit, then Dreo had slipped out of her cell, grabbed the keys and set them free. John had grabbed Elizabeth’s hand and run. The marines had retrieved their guns, laid down some covering fire, and they’d made a dash for it out of the temple complex where the negotiations had been held. They were now running pell-mell through the scrub and sparse forest surrounding the complex as they made a beeline for the gate. 

Baeldor was running point, leading Elizabeth, with Dreo flying overhead as a swift providing guidance. As one the two daemons veered left through the tree line. John and Elizabeth followed, narrowly avoiding fire from the enemy hidden off the path ahead.  
One of their marines wasn’t so lucky. As John glanced round, he could see Bane’s daemon disappear into a cloud of gold. Damn, this was going so badly sideways. 

Elizabeth was calling ahead to the Jumper and John could just make the clearing out through the trees.. The Prior was on their tail now too.

The Jumper rose from the clearing ahead and began firing off drones attempting to clear a safe path for them. Almost there. 

A bolt from the Prior’s staff impacted the Jumper and Elizabeth stumbled, a cry escaping her, as the Jumper exploded in midair, flaming pieces crashing down into the clearing in front of the gate. 

John grabbed Elizabeth’s arm, dragging her onwards, around the edge of the clearing to avoid the debris and take advantage of the cover as the Ansari fire increased. Baeldor had already changed course, heading now to the DHD, bounding up to the dais, he narrowly avoided a direct hit. John winced as the bullet grazed his daemon’s flank. 

The Prior was gaining on them - his raptor daemon had taken to the air and was on them. Dreo dodged and dived and then dropped like a stone into Elizabeth’s waiting arms as the daemon tried to menace her, but it was unwilling to make physical contact with her, and so was trying to prevent her from reaching the gate. 

Baeldor had dialed the sequence for their new Alpha site and John activated his GDO, firing wide at the Prior’s daemon and grabbing for Elizabeth to drag her through. 

Matthews was still behind them, pushing them on and to safety. 

John could feel Dreo and Elizabeth’s panic settling in his stomach, they hadn’t been in a life or death situation since they’d been rescued. John cursed himself again for putting them in harms way. But time for a guilt trip later. They were almost to the event horizon… 

Baeldor raced up, colliding with the other three and pushing them backwards and through… 

A glowing orb of energy from the Prior’s staff impacted the gate. Matthews screamed. Everything went red. 

They exited the gate fast, John curling around Elizabeth to shield her from the impact as they hit rocky ground. 

The daemons whimpered and John looked up. This wasn’t the Alpha site. 

This was Hell. 

~ 

The stargate was set on an elevated plateau: the sky burned overhead, and all around rivers of lava flowed through fields of barren black volcanic rock. Flames and smoke rose in pillars towards the sulfurous clouds. 

If this wasn’t Hell, it was Hell-adjacent. 

John helped Lizabeth to her feet. Dreo scuttled around them in salamander form, 

“I don’t see Matthews anywhere! And the DHD! I don’t see the DHD!” 

She was the only one who wasn’t immediately affected by the heat: Baeldor was already panting heavily and wincing as his paws hit the hot ground. Elizabeth pulled her jacket off and wrapped it around her face, covering her nose and mouth in a bid to block out the fumes. John followed her example as he scanned the horizon. 

“Dreo’s right, we lost Matthews. And the DHD isn’t anywhere around.”

Although it could still be in the vicinity: he could barely see through the endless ash and smoke in the atmosphere. “It could be nearby, we need to fan out.” 

Baeldor shook the ash from his fur and gingerly set his paws down as he inched forward towards the edge of the plateau. Dreo darted after him. 

“Not so far!” John could hear the undercurrent of stress in Elizabeth’s voice, she had a tendency to keep Dreo close when fear got the better of her. Dreo skittered back and up to her shoulder. 

“I’m sorry.” Elizabeth looked at him askance, before turning to face him properly.

“This is not your fault John.” 

“I’m head of Atlantis’ military and security, so, yeah, it kinda is.” he responded as they navigated a safe path towards the edge.  
He should have seen through the Ansari sooner. Not lost the marines, and the Jumper. 

Elizabeth sighed, “It’s a dangerous universe out here, John, I don’t expect you to keep every trouble from my door.”

“I know that, but it’s my job to protect you, Lizabeth.”

She moved closer, lowering her jacket from her face so he could see her expression clearly. 

“This is not your doing, John. I’m not holding you responsible. I know I haven’t fully gotten past what happened.. We’re trying, and it’s getting better. But I don’t blame you, John. I never did. And we’re going to find a way out of this. The four of us. Together.” 

And there it was. He still felt sick with guilt for leaving them. And he was terrified of losing them again. Terrified that they might just decide he wasn’t worth it and leave him. 

He knew she could see all of that in his eyes. She leaned up to brush a quick kiss across his lips. Dreo hopped across and settled on his shoulder. 

Elizabeth smiled at the sight of them, “Well, on the bright side - now we can say we’ve literally been through Hell together.” He couldn’t help the laugh, though it ended in a cough when he inhaled too much sulfur. Dreo hissed out a laugh, while Baeldor turned to roll his eyes at them, all the while dancing from paw to paw to keep them from singeing. 

“If anyone’s interested: I have some good news and some bad news.” Dreo rolled her eyes at his cliche. “Good news is I’ve found the DHD and it looks like its in one piece.” 

“Bad news is, it’s all the way over on the other side of this fiery pit.” 

All four of them stood at the edge and stared in dismay across a chasm a quarter mile across that dropped a few hundred feet to a river of lava. On the other side, about 100ft down on a rocky outcrop that seemed to have detached from the central plateau, the DHD sat undisturbed. 

Three pairs of eyes turned to Dreo as she shook her salamander scales mournfully. “It’s too far! It’s much too far from Bethan. And it’s so hot… My feathers would burn…”

“OK - options!” John was valiantly attempting to maintain his military cool, but the heat was a physical thing. They had minimal water rations and very little time. 

“Does Atlantis know where we ended up? They could send another Jumper through. We could wait for rescue.” Elizabeth was used to being the one dispatching the cavalry. 

“We need water. Supplies. We get over there ourselves.” Baeldor knew none of these were actually available but he was humoring John, so at least he wouldn’t be keeping up the silent treatment til they died. 

\\\ Well, we might be dying, but our girls certainly won’t be. \\\\. 

John was utterly terrified of the possibility and found comfort in his daemon’s determination. At least they were on the same page again. 

\\\ I’m always on your side! We’re the same side! You’re my human. \\\ 

John felt a small weight lift off his shoulders at that. He smiled at Baeldor, scrubbing his hand through the fur at his neck, and turned to see that their girls were deep in their own private conversation. 

“What are you thinking?” 

Elizabeth looked at him, assessing. Her gazed drifted down to Baeldor and then to Dreo as she skittered up her arm and rested on her shoulder, appraising them. . 

“John, when did Baeldor settle?” 

“What? What’s that got to do with anything?” 

“Maybe everything: Think back, when did he settle?” 

John and Baeldor looked to one another.  
\\\ We love them, we can be honest with them. \\\

“When we were twelve, when my mother died. He became a wolf that day, and well, just never changed again.” Pain edged his voice, and Elizabeth’s eyes teared up in sympathy.

“And before that… Before the accident, what form did you think Baeldor would settle as?” 

“A sparrow hawk.” It was Baeldor himself who answered. “I was going to be a sparrow hawk. All our family have bird daemons. Except us. We thought we’d always be able to fly.” 

John smiled softly at the memory, Baeldor let out a soft whine:  
“But we’re settled now - we can’t change. It’s not - !” 

He had been about to say possible but then realized how very stupid that would sound. Dreo giggled at him and stuck out her tongue at him. 

“But what if you could change form? What if you could be a sparrow hawk again? Just for a little while. We could fly together! I’d be able to go far away from Bethan if you were near me. We could fly to the DHD, dial Atlantis, and then we’d be home free!”

John reached out to feel Lizabeth’s forehead, passing her his canteen of water, “You’re definitely dehydrated.”  
Baeldor tried to playfully snap at Dreo’s salamander tail, but the heat was sapping his energy.  
“You’re losing your marbles!” 

Elizabeth rolled her eyes but sipped gratefully from the canteen. 

“I know it sounds crazy, but it’s not. Think about it. Ever since our little Odyssey, Dreo and Baeldor have been able to communicate with one another, they can alter our sense perceptions - and now Dreo can travel far from me so long as she’s with Baeldor.” 

“So, if Dreo can do what Baeldor can do, why wouldn’t the opposite be true - why couldn’t Baeldor change his form again when he’s near Dreo?” Elizabeth was obviously convinced of this. “The easiest form would be one he was familiar with, one he’d always though he would settle as.” 

John wasn’t buying it. “But it’s crazy! OK, so it’s not any crazier than anything else in our lives. But seriously, we’re trapped on a hell world, burning up in the heat, now is not a good time for rediscovering my inner child daemon!” 

Baeldor snorted at that - “I was partial to being a jackrabbit too.” 

“Not helping!” 

Dreo giggled raspily and slithered down Elizabeth’s arm to jump onto Baeldor’s back, mussing his fur, flattening herself against his neck to whisper in his ear. Words of encouragement. Instructions on how to shift form. Reminding him how it had felt. Reaching out to touch their daemon souls, entangling them together, feeling the warp and weft of their forms. 

Elizabeth touched John’s face tenderly, turning it back to hers. 

“The most important thing to remember is the feeling. How it felt to soar, to be free. Of worries, of cares. To feel like everything can be good, that life won’t weigh you down.””

“But it did.” 

All of the guilt, the failures, the pain… It had been holding him down for years. Ever since his mother’s death. He failed people. And they left him. 

“Life isn’t holding you down John, you’re the one holding on. Carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders. But you don’t have to.” 

“You are the most wonderful person I’ve ever met John, You do the impossible every day, more than anyone could rightly expect of you, and you still feel you should do more. You take on everyone else responsibilities. But you don’t have to. You don’t have to feel guilty. You don’t have to bear their burdens.” 

She smoothed her hand along his face. “It’s not your fault John. Let go of the past, let yourself remember how it felt to be young and free. Not a care in the world. And remember one thing:” 

Her hands clasped his face gently and brought it close to hers. Their daemons whispered to each other. Elizabeth whispered against his lips:

“I love you.”

He felt his spirit soar, as it did every time she said those words. She kissed him. 

Dreo squealed in delight. They pulled apart to look at her and John felt a wave of vertigo pass over him. Baeldor was gone - his wolf was nowhere to be seen.. 

“That’s because I’m up here!”

John blinked dumbfounded and looked up - Baeldor was hovering in a rising thermal at the edge of the ravine. Hovering. As a bird. A sparrow hawk. John’s brain shut down for a minute. 

“Don’t worry - feels a bit weird I know, not quite like when we were kids, but you’ll get the hang of it in no time.” 

John wanted to point out to Elizabeth that she really had no frame of reference for those assumptions but he was still processing. Could Baeldor change back? Was he stuck as a bird now? He loved his shaggy wolf… 

Baeldor faltered in midair, his form fluctuating, fuzzy around the edges. 

“Concentrate John! Think about flying!” 

Baeldor settled again, landing on Dreo’s back and hopping up and down. “Ha! My turn!” 

“I can’t quite believe it.” 

Elizabeth’s eyes were glowing, “It’s a wonderful feeling isn’t it? When they shift? The sense of freedom…” 

John smiled at that; she’d felt so alone all these years, he hadn’t ever realized how much, and now she could share this. 

“Yeah. Yeah it is.. To be flying again…” 

He reached out and Baeldor flew to him - flew! - and perched on his shoulder, speckled brown feathers ruffling. Just like he’d done when they were children. John smoothed a finger down his wing, only to find some feathers looked a little blackened. 

Baeldor held out his wing, “Not to put a damper on things, but it’s just too hot: even from here my feathers are toasting. The DHD is even closer to the lava - Dreo and I go over there, we’ll ignite!”

Dreo’s giddiness was irrepressible as she skidded around their feet, “Not a problem!”

“I beg to differ.” 

“No really, just wait!” 

Dreo changed to vixen form and jumped into Elizabeth’s waiting arms. They were gazing at one another intently, and John realized this was their ‘planning a cool shift’ look. 

“What do you ladies have in mind?” 

Elizabeth smirked at him, “Do you remember us telling you once that we could shift into any form - even fantastical creatures?” 

He was beginning to see where this was going, “You said you’d entertain the other kids ; you could be a unicorn, or a phoenix, or a dragon…” 

“I’ve seen unicorn-Dreo!” Baeldor tweeted in his ear, and he was so never getting used to that. He was also a tad jealous that he’d missed seeing her in that form. 

“Don’t worry,” Dreo cooed, “We can play at being a unicorn when we get home…” 

“Can we go for a ride?” Baeldor asked faux-innocently and John barely managed to suppress a smirk. 

Elizabeth gave them her patented narrow-eyed glare, and Dreo harrumphed, “AS I was saying…” 

“… But for now!” 

Elizabeth took a deep breath and … Oh wow. John wasn’t sure he’d ever seen a more beautiful creature. Dreo hovered before them, gold and scarlet feathers shimmering, flames licking along their edges. Her bright green eyes glowed like emeralds. Her long flaming tail fanned out behind her glittering and sparking. Elizabeth held out an arm and Dreo perched delicately, the flames licking harmlessly along her sleeve, reflecting in her own green eyes. And for the first time in what felt like forever, she seemed truly happy. 

“That’s amazing.” John was awe-struck. He could feel Baeldor shiver with joy at the sight.  
\\\ We love them. \\\  
“Yeah…we do.” John breathed out. Elizabeth cast him a questioning look and he realized he’d spoken aloud. Baeldor snickered. John went to ruffle his fur…  
"Now, now, watch the feathers!"  
Never getting used to it. 

Elizabeth grinned and launched Dreo into the air, she circled around them.  
“Come on Baeldor! Spread those wings! Take to the air!”  
She was enjoying this life and death situation far too much for John’s liking.  
// Be careful with her! //  
\\\ I will. \\\ 

Baeldor took a deep breath and took flight. Freedom! John could feel the lightness in his soul as Baeldor circled overhead, gliding above Dreo. Her phoenix feathers glowed in the heat but weren’t singed and shielded Baeldor’s from the worst of it. The two daemons made one final circuit about their humans, settled into a synched rhythm and headed out over the edge of the cliff, gliding along on thermals across the chasm to the DHD on it’s lonely outcrop. 

John pulled Elizabeth close; she tended to get a little wobbly and disorientated with larger separations and he wasn’t risking her toppling over the edge. 

Their daemons reached the outcrop and alighted on the dais where the DHD stood. Dreo kept her wings spread and arched over Baeldor to fend off the intense heat. Even so, his feathers were already beginning to scorch. 

It was tough going. Ordinarily, Dreo would simply shift into a form with opposable thumbs and dial out, but having to maintain her phoenix form left her with only her beak. It took her a few tries to depress each one, with Baeldor managing to get one on the far side of the dial for her. 

Elizabeth and John watched anxiously, holding their breath. 

Then the sequence locked and the gate whooshed to life. John, dragging Elizabeth with him, ran to the gate and stuck his hand through the event horizon to keep the gate from deactivating while she radioed in and sent the IDC. 

For a heart stopping minute the daemons struggled to get airborne again while keeping Baeldor from combusting in the searing heat of the lava not far below them. They caught a thermal and were gaining altitude, drifting far too slowly for John’s liking back across the chasm. Then they were across and streaking towards their humans. 

Dreo soared straight onto her Bethan’s out stretched arm, landing gracefully, before almost collapsing back into her vixen form and cuddling round her neck. They both looked euphoric but drained. Definitely a little punch drunk. 

Baeldor, on the other hand, hadn’t quite remembered how to land yet and collided with John like a feathered guided missile. That settled back into his wolf form on contact with John, knocking him off balance and sending all four of them flying backwards through the open wormhole… 

… To land in a rather ungainly heap on Atlantis’ gate room floor. 

Marines and medics rushed to secure the area and check them for injuries. They were soon carted off to the infirmary for some scrapes and bruises and mild smoke inhalation. 

“Hell and back.. See! The four of us together are indomitable!” 

Elizabeth and John chuckled at Dreo’s exuberance. She cuddled closer to Bethan’s chest and winked at John and Baeldor. He reached down to run his hand through his fur, and remembered the lightness of feathers. 

He would always worry, and always feel responsible for his people. And most especially for Lizabeth and Dreo. But maybe, just maybe, he could let some of that guilt go… 

“Rodney will be back in a few days and there’s a call scheduled to check in with Pegasus. You should get the team together for a chat.” 

Yeah, maybe he would do that.

They had lost four good people today, and would doubtless lose others. Friends came and went, relationships changed. He met Elizabeth’s eyes and knew that no matter what happened, they loved each other and they would make the most of the life they were given, that was really all that mattered. 

~

Two bird daemons, a swift and a sparrow hawk, soared through the air, swooping and diving, they circled each other and the City’s spires and towers, making a game of keeping within the City's shields. Their humans leaned against the railing of their balcony and looked out at the stars.


	2. Fire in the Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Why settle for just being a System Lord?  
> Dreo and Elizabeth deal with the Ori while recovering from their experiences on Asuras.

Atlantis had been on high alert for months now, and Elizabeth and Dreo’s combined patience was wearing thin. 

The Ori's infiltration was becoming more apparent and more bold every week, with a number of ships sighted at the fringes of the Milky Way, as well as the increasing numbers of Priors. 

So far none of Earth’s closest allies had succumbed to Origin, but a number of their trading partners had converted under duress. The SGC had been unable to capture any of the Priors so far; they had come prepared and their technological defenses had improved since their first foray into the galaxy.  
Having thought that the problem of the Ori had been solved by SG1 and the use of Merlin’s device, they were now on the back foot and trying to shore up Earth’s defenses against a second incursion and possible all out war. 

Hence the high alert and Elizabeth’s fraying nerves as she filed through endless paper work in her office, trying to prepare the City to be both a defensive outpost and possibly a haven if the worst happened and Earth fell. 

One positive note: Rodney had returned full time to Atlantis to upgrade the city’s defensive systems and take back the running of the science department. 

Elizabeth had made sure that he’d attended movie night his first week back to break the ice with John. It’d been her turn to pick and she’d chosen the third star wars prequel just because Rodney and John hadn’t shut up once the first time they’d watched it. And it had that big battle on a lava planet: Baeldor loved to brag about how they’d recently escaped one of those. 

This movie night Baeldor had curled up at her right side, his head on her lap, with John on her left and Dreo between them. It had started off awkward, with Rodney huffing in derision throughout the opening scenes but otherwise quiet. Stella still wasn’t used to seeing their daemons interacting with two humans and had been side-eyeing them uncomfortably. But by the time the final showdown had begun the pair were arguing the film’s merits like little boys and Stella was happily explaining the physics of spontaneous combustion to Dreo, who feigned interest, while Baeldor offered off-color comments through their shared connection. 

Their old sense of camaraderie had slowly returned, and Elizabeth was now planning on convincing Teyla and Ronan to make a return visit with the Daedalus next month to get the old team back together. 

It looked like things were going to work out. 

Which would probably explain why the off-world activation alarm chose this moment to sound. 

// You had to think that Bethan! //

“Raise the shield!” Elizabeth called out as she exited her office, with Dreo flying ahead to watch the gate, and headed for the gate technician’s panel. Marines flooded into the gate room below, weapons aimed. 

The wormhole engaged; John and Rodney radioed in that they were on their way. 

The shield trembled. Then shut down. 

A Prior stepped through. 

The gunfire was instantaneous but ineffective, bullets bouncing off the Prior’s personal shield. 

“John, Rodney, we need those anti-Prior weapons now!” Elizabeth shouted into her radio to be heard over the noise and took cover behind the console as the Prior fired his staff’s energy weapon into the gateroom. Dreo shifted to a dormouse and crawled to the front edge so they could see what was happening below. 

A third of their Marines were already down, and Elizabeth could only hope they were still alive as she called for medics. 

John appeared around the doorway to the Jumper bay with Rodney’s latest innovation: a blaster designed to disable Ori technology. Rodney himself crouched down behind her, Stella whispering:

“We’ve only just had time to finish the calibrations!” 

John took the shot - a direct hit. The Prior’s energy shield wavered, fizzled out for a split second, then returned to full strength. John fired again, but the Ori technology had already adapted. The Prior kept firing, methodically taking out their defenses.

“Shit! Rodney! This thing isn’t working!” 

“Yes, yes, obviously! I’m not blind! It mustn’t have been strong enough to short out the power crystal..”

“Lock down the city and send an emergency distress signal to Earth.” Elizabeth ordered the technician. “Rodney, get to John and see what you can do!” 

She collected Dreo as Stella flapped into the air, narrowly missing being hit by a blast. Rodney grabbed her and ran into the upper corridor, making his roundabout way to the lower level. 

“John, how’s it looking?” asked Elizabeth, as she made her way to the security console further along the row. 

“Not good! We’re losing marines fast!” 

Dreo scampered up to look over the console again, and winced at what she saw.  
// Bethan, we need to buy them some time. We need to negotiate with it. //

Elizabeth let out a shaky sigh. John would be furious, but Dreo was right. 

“Dr Weir! There’s a 20% drop in power across the city.” Radek’s voice cut in. 

The lights flickered and began to dim. Elizabeth could feel the city’s hum fading. 

“Radek?! What’s that Prior doing?” 

“He’s taking remote control of our systems and shutting everything down. The Prior’s staff seems to also be syphoning energy into itself..” Radek replied. 

“Anyway to stop him?” Elizabeth could feel their control of the situation slipping away. 

“Radek, try cycling the computer system and switching to the backup power generators -“ Rodney cut in. 

“I have thought of this already! It isn’t helping..” 

“Elizabeth, don’t risk it, you need to fall back! ” She looked to Dreo accusingly: her daemon had been telling tales. The main lights faded out to be replaced by the dim red glow of the emergency system. 

// Bethan, that Prior.. It has a raptor daemon too, just like the one on Ansar. It looks like a dinosaur crossed with a cat.. //  
\\\ The last one look like a cross with a ferret didn’t it..\\\  
// So maybe the daemons become raptors when the person becomes a Prior? //  
\\\ So maybe if you become a raptor he’ll think we’re one of them and stop for a chat? \\\

Elizabeth took a deep breath and activated her comms. “Evacuate the gate room, regroup in the emergency control room. I’m going to open a dialogue with our guest.”

“Elizabeth! Don’t do this!”

John and Baeldor were terrified, she could feel it. 

Elizabeth was terrified too. But then she’d felt terror and fear were constant companions since Asuras. The terror of the nightmarish scenarios that Oberoth had put her through still woke her from her sleep. The fear of being alone with only her daemons and no John or Atlantis to come to her rescue was still there even as she sat in her reclaimed office. 

She’d been alone on Asuras. There had been no one she could trust except her daemons; she had felt abandoned in an alien galaxy with no way home. Atlantis had moved on without her. They’d given her up for dead and done what John had said they would never do: they’d left her behind… 

Elizabeth had felt powerless, and that terrified her more than anything else. 

// You had me, Bethan // She took another breath. She felt the tightness in her chest easing a little. 

// And what am I? A cuddly toy? // Baeldor could always make her smile. 

There had been times when she thought she wouldn’t make it, and if it hadn’t been for Dreo and Baeldor she knew she wouldn’t have survived. Her daemons had never stopped believing that John would come for them. And he had. 

Since John had found her on Arla, she’d been trying to recreate her old life in the City in the hopes that the terror would abate, but it was still with her. 

// And it’s stopping us from doing what we need to do to protect Atlantis // 

Dreo shifted, assuming a form similar to the ancient dinosaur like raptors the Priors used. She looked for all the world like a miniature dragon.. 

Elizabeth breathed out, stood up straight and walked to the stairs. Dreo launched herself into the air with a piercing shriek and circled overhead. 

This time the Prior didn’t go for the daemon - he paused in his attack, confused, watching them as they descended the steps. 

Elizabeth paused mid-way down, Dreo settling on the steps above her, and addressed the Prior. 

“Explain yourself: why have you attacked my city?” 

Dreo extended her wings and shrieked again - it was unearthly and even the Prior seemed to shrink back a little. 

“I bring the Light of Origin. You will accept it or die.” He no longer seemed entirely certain.

The Prior was focussed solely on Elizabeth and Dreo, ignoring the others. His daemon was flapping her wings and hissing, as if trying to assert dominance over Dreoides. 

Out of the corner of her eye Elizabeth could see Rodney and Stella desperately working on the anti-Prior weapon, while John and Baeldor were moving into position to body tackle them if it came to it. 

“My people have no wish to die. But in order to truly accept Origin, the must first understand it. I would teach them. ” 

“Truthfully spoken. I am charged to pass on the Light. Your people have been corrupted by the Lying Ones.” 

“That may be so. We know only what they have taught us but we are willing to learn. But I have glimpsed the Light of Origin, as you see…” Elizabeth gestured towards Dreoides, “What of the Book I have heard spoken of? I would read the truth from its pages.” 

Dreo drew herself up, hissing proudly. The Prior looked impressed. “The Book contains the Truth..” 

“Indeed, and the Truth is powerful tool against those you call the Lying Ones. My people wish to hear it. But you must then give us time to read from the Book so that we may come to fully understand the truth of Origin.” 

Elizabeth wasn’t sure the Prior would buy it, but every minute counted. If only they had had more time, even an extra day.. A day.. Dreo almost giggled as the memory of an old fairy tale her father had told them ran through their minds. 

“We request one day here in the City to come to an understanding. By the time the Sun next rises you will have your answer.” 

The Prior seemed to consider, then replied, “You may have one day.” 

“Until next the Sun rises, then. I have your word, on the Book of Origin, that you will allow us that time to learn?” 

“You have my word on the Sacred Text.” 

Stella squawked and Rodney was working up to interject when John kicked him in the shins. 

The Prior extracted a manuscript from beneath his cloak and proffered it to Elizabeth, who began to descend the steps towards him. Before she could get within 10 feet, Baeldor had cut her off and John was stepping up to accept the book instead with a creditable attempt at formality. He backed away slowly, surreptitiously checking the book was only that, before passing it to her. Dreo flapped her wings regally. 

“We shall retreat now to my Sanctuary to study the word of the Ori, so that I may learn and understand, and convey their wisdom to my people.” 

“Until the Sun rises,” he repeated to her. 

The Prior seemed to freeze in place, his daemon balanced menacingly on his shoulders with wings outstretched. 

~

The three of them had gathered in her office while the medics treated the wounded and a team of marines had set up watch over the Prior. Rodney still kept his voice low as he whispered,  
“Elizabeth, what do you mean sun rise? Atlantis doesn’t rotate! We’re at a Lagrange point, in an essentially tidally locked orbit around Earth, facing the Sun..” Dreo snorted, Elizabeth just gave him her patented look. “She knows that Rodney!” John grabbed the book back and threw it at him. “Go check this isn’t boobytrapped or something.” 

“But what’s the Prior going to do? Just stand there forever?” 

“If we’re very lucky, yes! But given our track record I imagine it’ll be no more than an hour before he realizes somethings up, so get a move on!” Elizabeth ordered. 

“Right, right, I’ll just go and save the day by inventing an entirely new science..” Stella flapped her wings indignantly, but then settled down to whisper ideas to him. 

John looked back to Elizabeth. “That was an insane stunt.”

Baeldor growled softly, but pushed her back towards the sofa where they settled and he could lie across her lap. 

“I know, but it paid off. Have we any contact with Earth?” 

Dreo flittered around John’s head before cuddling up in his arms.

“No, communications are jammed, no way of knowing if a Prior came through at the SGC too.”

“Ok, so we’re on our own until the Daedalus gets back. We should send someone down in a Jumper.” 

“If he’s dormant now we could maybe take him out with Rodney’s weapon.” 

“Even if we could, then what? We wait for the next one? No, long term we need to deal with these people, John.” 

“They’re Ori! They don’t negotiate!” 

“Apparently they do now.” Dreo had settled back into her vixen form; they were both visibly tired out by the effort of having held such an unnatural shape for so long. She saw their concerned looks. “It’s not a real animal that’s all, it takes concentration, Bethan and I are fine.” 

“Was that your dragon form then?” Baeldor feigned being unimpressed to get a rise out of her. 

“Wyvern! You heathen. Wyvern!” Dreo mocked, “Dragon’s have four legs, wyverns are smaller and have two.” 

Baeldor and John shared a cheeky grin, “And you said this galaxy couldn’t get any weirder!” 

“Just you wait until you see my real dragon form, I’ll blow your socks off.” 

“Figuratively or with fire?” Baeldor laughed as Dreo dived at him and they mocked fought on her office floor. Some of the tension drained out of their humans. 

Elizabeth looked at Dreo pensively, then turned her attention to John, “You might be finding that out sooner rather than later.”

“You’re going over this guy’s head aren’t you?”

She gave him a faint smile, “I’m going to go direct to the Ori themselves.”

“This is probably the craziest thing we’ve ever done.”

“That it is.”

“We’re doing this together, you know that right?”

“I know.”

The fear was slowly ebbing away. She was beginning to trust in her connection to her City and her people again. 

~

“OK, this time the weapon is going to work!” 

The command team sat around the conference table. It had been twenty-three hours since the Prior arrived and he had yet to move again. Elizabeth figured he was giving them the one Earth day he’d promised. That was a good sign, it meant they were willing to display trust. Now she hoped she wasn’t going to antagonize them too much with her ‘endless day’ ruse. 

“Hopefully we won’t have need of them just yet, but let’s be prepared for a violent reaction.”

“You’re really going to ask it to introduce you to the Ori?” Lorne sounded both displeased and slightly in awe of her. Everyone else around the table looked similarly incredulous. 

“Yes, I am. I’ve been studying their texts and our intelligence reports for months now. They have a hierarchical society. They are demanding fealty from us just like an old feudal lord on Earth. And they really don’t like the Ancients. If I can convince the Prior that I outrank him in the hierarchy then perhaps he’ll take me to speak with someone higher again - assuming the Ori are willing to meet. If we can convince them that we are paying due respect to them and not the Ancients, maybe we can stave off an outright war. ” 

John smiled at her. “So no big deal then? We’ll keep the weapons at the ready just in case.”

“Do. Alright everyone, let’s move!” 

~

Exactly 24 hours after it had frozen, the Prior awoke. 

“Have you come to accept the Path of Origin?” 

Elizabeth stood before him with Dreo again in her wyvern form, and her command staff flanking her. 

“Why do you ask this question so soon? The Sun has not yet set, nor has it again risen over my City.” 

“It has been one day on your world!” The Prior raised his staff in anger, aiming it at her chest. Dreo shrieked at him. 

“I did not ask for one day on my world, but one day on my City. You gave your word! Are the Priors of the Ori so faithless?” 

“You are untrustworthy! You serve the Lying Ones!” 

“No indeed! It is you who are faithless, you who could not discern the Truth of the riddle I set you. You who would prevent us from studying the sacred word of the Ori. It is you who serves the Lying Ones!” Dreo rose into the air, screeching at the Prior’s shaking daemon. 

“I wish to hear the Truth spoken, then I will choose whether to follow the Path or not. I wish to learn of Origin from the Ori themselves.”

The Prior seemed to turn inwards, his daemon slithering around his legs. His staff glowed as he communed with his masters. 

When he spoke again his voice was no longer his own, 

“ELIZABETH WEIR. WE WILL SPEAK WITH YOU!”

The Prior returned to himself, “You will follow me, I will take you to my Masters.”

~

“I hate sand!” 

Elizabeth managed to roll her eyes at Baeldor, despite everything. Dreo fanned her wings, then helped him to shift into his sparrow hawk form. 

The Atlantis team had stepped through the gate into an endless flat desert. There were no mountains or hills. No sign of water, or life. The planet’s star seemed more distant than most habitable worlds she been too. It provided thin clear light, but little heat. 

John motioned to Lorne and his team to spread out and keep watch, while Rodney had Stella check the nearby DHD was functional. 

The Prior turned to them, “Those uninvited must remain outside the Circle.” He motioned to Elizabeth, “You will follow me.” 

“Elizabeth…” John cautioned. 

She brushed her fingertips along his arm, then followed the Prior as he began to walk away from the gate. John launched Baeldor into the air, and Elizabeth could sense him high above, keeping her in sight. 

The Prior lead them directly away from the stargate and Elizabeth was surprised to find that the sand was hard packed underneath her feet. As she walked, she could see a path emerging from the sand and looked up to see a circle of blood red ruby monoliths had appeared in the near distance. 

// John sees it too, they’re following us //

The circle was huge, perhaps 500ft across, each of the 12 monolithic stones reaching 50ft into the sky, arranged in a perfect circle, the sunlight filtering through them gave the internal space a fiery glow. 

Elizabeth followed the Prior to the edge of the ring, where he gestured for them to continue on alone. Inside was empty, save for another smaller version of the ring in the centre, this one only 50ft across. There was a circular table at its heart made of the same ruby-colored stone, like a large conference table. Or Camelot’s Round Table. Two matching curved benches were placed on the East and West sides. 

Sitting on the Western bench was a hooded figure, dressed in the robes of the Ori. 

Glancing back, she could see John and their team had arrived and were holding position at the circle’s edge. Overhead, Baeldor hovered. The hooded figure flicked a finger and Baeldor was spun through the air towards John, landing at his feet in wolf form again. 

// Bethan, look! //

From every direction Priors were approaching. They filled the gaps between the stones, and fanned out behind, hundreds of them. Each with their distorted raptor daemon. 

Touching Dreo’s snout for comfort, Elizabeth approached the central table and took her seat on the Eastern bench. 

~

The Ori raised his head and she could see that beneath the cloak was an Ascended being who had deigned to just barely take on human form. His hands were no more than flames, but grey eyes glowed in his thin pale face, surrounded by a nimbus of flaming fair hair. 

He had no daemon that she could see, and yet Elizabeth didn’t feel unsettled; his daemon seemed to be an integral part of him, like those human in parallel realities. 

Dreo placed herself on the bench beside her and extended a wing protectively around her back, scraping the talons of each wing into the glassy stone of the table to either side of her. 

The Ori smiled, his flames glowing brighter for a moment. 

“You wished to speak with us Elizabeth Weir. Be welcome.” 

His voice sounded like flames crackling warmly in a winter fire. Designed to evoke comfort and safety. She remembered Daniel Jackson’s theory that the Ancients had encouraged an association between evil and fire in Earth mythology to instill an instinctive distrust of the Ori precisely for this reason. 

“A Truth: They would have you fear us.”

Dreo hissed in surprise and Elizabeth flinched. He could read their minds. 

“Only what you do not wish to remain hidden.” 

“We do not trespass on your bond with your daemon, or your mate.” 

She’d been thinking about John and the daemons. 

“Yes.”

Alright then. That would make negotiations a little more interesting. 

“You can read my mind but I can’t read yours, that gives you a distinct advantage: I have yet to learn your name.” 

“That is not our purpose.”

“What is your purpose then, in agreeing to speak with me?” 

“To uncover a Truth.”

“What truth?” 

“Who you are. Who you will be.”

“What does that mean?” Elizabeth paused, “You mean a test.” 

The Ori smiled once more, then disappeared. 

The Priors readied their staff weapons and moved to attack. 

~

The Priors advanced through the circle, the stones giving their usual pallor a devilish hue. Their daemons took to the air, screeching and diving as they jostled against one another. There had to be at least a thousand of them.

John and Baeldor had broken away from the team and were sprinting towards her, Rodney was hot on his heels with his anti-Ori device, and Lorne and rest were following up behind, laying down fire to keep the closest Priors from cutting them off. 

Baeldor reached her first, “Well, its going great so far!” He faced the oncoming Priors and readied to defend them. 

Dreo took to the air. John came up, they shared a brief meaningful look, and then the others were there and taking up positions using the inner ring for cover.  
“I’ve got the weapon working this time, we can do a wide beam, dispersed burst -” Rodney was tinkering with the device on the table. 

“Ma’am, we have about 30 seconds..” Lorne had taken up guard behind her. 

It occurred to her in that moment that they had each of them run into fire for her. 

These were her people, her friends, John… 

She’d be damned if she’d let any harm come to them. 

Elizabeth concentrated all her emotions towards Dreo, and remembered the fierceness she’d conjure up as a little girl telling stories of crafty princesses, and brave knights, and wizards, and castles… 

… and Dragons. 

Dreo’s fierce roar was deafening. Her scales gleamed a dull coppery red, tipped with gold. Her huge leathery wings were so wide they reached passed the standing stones, her shadow blocked out the sun. 

The Priors froze in place, their raptor-daemons cowering before the magnificent dragon. 

Then all Hell broke lose. 

They were charging at them from every direction, John and the team began firing at the un protected raptor daemons and dodging behind the stones as the Priors hurled energy bolts low to avoid hitting their counterparts. 

Dreo screamed, circled upwards, and then came diving down in a wide arc, breathing fire and scattering the Priors before her. They fell back and regrouped. Dreo came around again for another run. 

“Rodney, now would be a good time!” Elizabeth could feel herself weakening with the exertion and had to lean against the table to remain upright. 

“Almost there!” 

Dreo came around for a third run, breathing fire and tearing at the raptors who were now attempting to flee before her. 

“Now!”

The energy blast rippled through the stones, causing a resonant hum. 

The Prior’s staff weapons and personal shields winked out and remained off. 

Elizabeth stood up, leaning on John, and called Dreo. She landed, wrapping herself around them all and the table, folding her wings protectively. 

“Stop!” 

The Priors obeyed. 

“Hear me! We do not wish a war with you. We fight only to protect ourselves.” 

“We do not serve the Ancients, those you call the Lying Ones. Likewise, we do not serve the Ori. We live freely, for ourselves and for each other.” 

“In killing us, you do not serve the Ori! They wished to protect all life, to nurture it! By killing us you only serve the Ancients, who will not interfere to protect us.” 

“By fighting against us, you commit sacrilege. You do what most displeases the Ori. You destroy life. You have placed yourselves above them!” 

Many of the Priors quailed in fear at the mere thought of offending their masters. 

“The Ori wish for you to live in safety and in peace. They wish to protect you. They asked you only to spread the message of that safety and protection to others that they may have the choice to accept it or not.”

“They gave you fire and built you a warm hearth, where any could find welcome. And instead you chose to use that fire to burn and destroy!” 

Dreo hissed out a stream of fire into the sky above them, and the raptor daemons whimpered. 

“No longer! The Ori have spoken to me. They have appointed me their Voice in this Galaxy. You may teach the Path of Origin. You may lead the way. If you lead well, then the Children will follow. If you do not they will turn from you and from the Path of Origin.” 

“You will do no harm to the peoples of this Galaxy. The Ori have spoken!”

“Go!”

The Priors gathered their daemons close and turned to depart. A wave of energy passed through the circle and they disappeared back to where they had come from.  
Dreo collapsed back into her vixen form and had to drag herself to Elizabeth’s side. 

“You have done well, Elizabeth Weir.” 

The Atlanteans spun in the direction of the voice, to find that the Ori had reappeared in his seat at the table. 

“You wanted to test me, to see if I could control the Priors.”

“A Truth: You may choose to follow, others will choose if you may lead.”

Her people had followed her to this world, to this table. Because they believed in her. Because even if she had been appointed as leader of the Atlantis Expedition, they had made the decision to follow her. 

“The Priors follow the Ori. My daemon can only pretend to be a dragon for a short space of time. Yet they listened to me.”

“Yes.” 

“Do you intend to be as mysterious as the Ancients then? You called them the Lying Ones.”

The Ori smiled and waved his hand. Her people were each moved to various points around the circle, out of earshot. Only John and Baeldor remained by her side. She sat at her bench again in her best diplomatic posture. John stood behind her allowing her to rest gently against him, while Baeldor propped up an exhausted Dreo.

“We may speak in Truths now.”

“The Ancient weapon your people deployed against us could never have harmed us. We were not destroyed. Merely cut off from this plane for a short span of time.” 

“Not all Ori wish to be worshipped. Some wished only to help those without power. But some became greedy for the devotion of the lower planes. They began to believe the stories they themselves had crafted.”

“When those you call the Ancients lead you to the Ark of Truth, it was an opportunity for us to show that we needed no worship. That we had gone too far in our quest to protect you from yourselves. And from the Lying Ones.”

“Why would we need to be protected from the Ancients?”

The Ori looked at her pityingly.

“The Ancients left the Stargates behind as playthings.  
The Ancients left weapons for the younger races to use against each other.  
The Ancients aided Anubis and then refused to control him.  
The Ancients created the Replicators, both in this galaxy and the Asurans, and let them loose upon the younger races.  
The Ancients created the Wraith as an experiment and left them to prey upon the Children.”

“That’s not true! You’re lying!” John’s outburst was predictable but it wouldn’t help to antagonize the Ori, Elizabeth grabbed his wrist to still him. 

“The Ancient One will defend his own.”

“What do you mean that John is Ancient? How can we know that you are telling us the truth?”

“The Ancient One was born with the marker. He is one of them, and acts according to their will.”

“John has free will, he acts as he wishes.”

“Appearances are not what they seem. A Truth: If a Leaf falls from the Tree, can it choose where it falls?”

“So you’re saying they are responsible for the situations we’ve found ourselves in, and we run along like rats in a maze.”

“Yes.”

“Aren’t you doing the same?”

“You know we are here.”

“You instigated a holy war that has killed millions.”

“We wished only to protect you from harm and from the ones you call Ancients.”

“There is so much history between your two sides that we aren’t privy to.. You were once the same race?”

“We are still the same race.”

“So, we’re fighting your ideological battles for you. Fighting and dying.  
Well, we no longer wish to fight your wars. How can we make it stop?”

“The Tools of the Parent are not the Toys of the Child.”

Elizabeth had an epiphany. Ever since the Stargate had been discovered they’d been using technology that they hadn’t created, and didn’t fully understand, to wage war with aliens who were using that same stolen technology. They were faced with a Universe littered with Alteran science projects that had been allowed to run amok. 

The Ancients were essentially handing them a gun and telling them to go play. While the Ori wanted to smother them and control their existence to prevent them from doing just that. 

Elizabeth had made her career on being a staunch advocate for gun control. 

“So. What happens if you take away the gun?”

The Ori smiled at her beatifically. 

“That is what we wish to discover.”

~

The Ancients and Ori had been using them to hash out a political solution to their ideological war for millennia, so Elizabeth didn’t expect that they would solve their problems overnight. 

But now at least, she could help them broker a compromise. Gathering a team of diplomats from Earth and all their allies across the Milky Way and Pegasus, she set about crafting a treaty. 

The Ori would agree not to force anyone to follow Origin and would allow the people of the Milky Way to live in peace. The Ancients would agree to help them remove dangerous artifacts and technologies from the hands of the younger races and allow them to develop at their own pace. 

They had also agreed to the Ori demand to deal with the dangerous races they had created. Teyla had been especially vocal on dealing with the Wraith and providing protection for the humans in Pegasus, and had wept tears of joy when the combined forces of Ori and Ancients had convinced them to undergo Carson’s Ancient-enhanced antiviral treatments. 

One huge blow was the Ori insistence that the younger races must also give up use of the Stargates. 

Only certain gates were allowed to remain active, and the Ascended would only allow their use for limited purposes. 

Stargate Command would retain its use of Atlantis’ gate, but would no longer be allowed to send teams off world exploring. The Ascended insisted that if they wanted to get back out into the Galaxy they would have to do so on their own. 

The Atlantis Expedition was finally broken up, and the City became their off-world colony. A place where those who had worked in the Program could remind themselves that it had all been real. 

Elizabeth, John, and their daemons stayed with the City, until their children were born, when they moved back to Earth to build a home near David’s family. 

It was only a one and a half million kilometer commute to work after all. 

~

John and Elizabeth curled up on their porch swing, watching as their children played tag among the fallen leaves; their rambunctious daemons keeping Dreo and Baeldor on their proverbial toes. Extended family and some non-US Atlantis staff were due to arrive any minute to celebrate Thanksgiving dinner together and they were enjoying the last few moments of calm before the storm. 

“Well, we have dealt with worse..” 

“Oh I don’t know, I think dealing with the Ori may have been easier!”


	3. Endings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In an alternate universe they said that just as you died your life would flash before you eyes. 
> 
> In this universe they said that just as you died your daemon remembered every form they ever held.

Elizabeth rose stiffly from the chair at her old desk, leaning heavily on Baeldor for support as she stood and stretched. The grizzled old wolf-daemon nuzzled her side before fetching her walking stick closer to hand. With one hand on the stick and the other in Baeldor’s fur, Elizabeth made her way slowly across the walkway overlooking the Stargate towards the bored technician. It was a particularly slow day, with no-one due in from Earth. Ever since their peace treaty with the Ori, use of the gate system had been curtailed, and so most of the traffic through the stargate was from Earth or their closer allies. The majority of comings-and-goings through the City now came via Puddle Jumper or the ships in Earth’s newly expanded fleet. 

Her old office was no longer used by the City’s Governor: her son Alexander’s office was in the main organizational hub they’d discovered further down the central tower. It was now preserved, like a display in a museum. 

“I’m not sure what it says about us that they let us sit in there.” Elizabeth addressed her husband’s daemon. “I’m beginning to feel like an old relic myself, wheeled out for show!” 

“Never! We’re all far too young to be put out to pasture.” 

“Baeldor, you do remember that this party is for my 90th birthday don’t you?” 

// Yes, and you’re still as beautiful as ever, Lizabeth. And have we ever forgotten your birthday?// 

Elizabeth narrowed her eyes at him, but the old daemon just chuckled. After almost six decades she supposed the effect had worn off. 

She and Baeldor had been out taking their daily constitutional and a break from all the fussing over her party. After all this time she still liked to drop by the gate room every day, even if the City’s command and control was now several levels below. Baeldor had been accompanying her, while Dreoides stayed with John. Over the decades she and John had become accustomed to having the other’s daemon with them, so that now it seemed only natural that Dreo had stayed behind to keep him out of trouble. 

Their daughter Victoria had just arrived from Earth with her brood; Elizabeth had left them building model planes and making jigsaws. // They are throwing bits everywhere! // Dreo sent in an exasperated tone, along with the mental image of her reaching under a sideboard to retrieve yet another lost piece. The children’s daemons were having too much fun stealing pieces and hiding them, entertained by the array of forms Dreo’d been taking on to reach the mislaid pieces. 

Sharing a grin, Elizabeth and Baeldor decided it was time to return to the fray and took the transporter directly back to their floor, pausing as they usually did to admire the panoramic view of the Asteroid Belt from the corridor window.   
“Alright, we’d better go save them!” Elizabeth smiled down at the wolf daemon, and then froze in horror - Baeldor seemed to blur, turning to golden dust around the edges. She could hear a sudden commotion coming from their apartment…  
“Lizabeth!” Baeldor collapsed, his form phasing. Elizabeth screamed. 

~

The soft steady beeping of the heart monitor woke Elizabeth from her light doze. She reached reflexively for John’s hand, reassured to feel his warmth and the faint pulse at his wrist. 

“They’re ok, Bethan, I’ve been watching over them.” Dreo was vixen-formed, curled up in her lap, green eyes fixed on the hospital bed where John lay sleeping with Baeldor at his side. 

The last day was a painful blur. The doctors had told her that John had suffered a stroke. The City’s Ancient medical tech had been able to heal most of the damage but they couldn’t be certain until he regained consciousness. Alexander and Victoria had taken turns through the night watching with her, and the grandkids had been by earlier to drop off hand-drawn get well cards and flowers that now littered the bedside table. 

They couldn’t lose them. The thought chased it way unceasingly around her head. She couldn’t imagine living her life without John and Baeldor - it was like trying to imagine life without her daemon: unthinkable. 

// If they die, then I’ll die of a broken heart. And then you’ll die, and the babies will be left all alone.. We can’t let that happen Bethan! // 

Elizabeth rubbed her cheek against her daemon’s fur. Dreo had been with John when he’d collapsed and had shared the memory of that moment with her. The fear and helplessness, her daemon didn’t want to face the fact that they were nearing the end of their lives, that their wonderful life together couldn’t last forever. 

// Yes it can, Bethan! We have to convince them, it’s the only way. //

Ascension. 

Ever since they’d first encountered the concept, she and Dreo had felt the allure of ascending to a higher plane and of gaining such vast knowledge. Only to be disappointed to find that politics transcended even the earthly plane of existence. Since they’d negotiated the peace treaty with them , Elizabeth had been the point of contact for the ascended Ori, and they’d been more than happy to ‘tempt her away’ from the Ancients by telling her their own stories of Ascension. 

At first it had been mostly academic interest, she’d had her family and her work to focus on.   
Then as the years passed, Dreo had raised the subject more and more, and they’d begun to actively work towards Ascension. 

\\\ John would never agree to it - they don’t want to Ascend, they never have. \\\ 

// They will if we ask them to. //

\\\ And then resent us? Forever? \\\

// Baeldor never would. He promised he’d never leave us, and so did John. If we Ascended first.. //

\\\ We can’t blackmail them like that! \\\

// Yes. We. Can. // Dreo enunciated each word sullenly in her head. 

Her daemon was still shaken by John’s sudden downturn. They’d spent over three decades poring over Ancient texts and studying Atlantis’ databases, even learning to meditate. Dreo believed they were close, and to be honest, so did she. And now they were running out of time. 

Over the years the four of them had discussed it repeatedly. John had been adamantly against the idea from the beginning, having never forgotten his time in the Sanctuary. They’d argued the pros and cons; the next great adventure versus being stuck with the other Ascended beings. John always ended those argument by reminding her of all the Rules they’d have to follow, and how fond they all were of breaking said Rules.. A weak smile crossed Elizabeth’s face at the memories, and Dreo giggled softly, moving from her lap to nuzzle Baeldor’s salt-and-pepper fur. She laid her head against John’s chest, squeezing his hand tighter in her own. 

~

She woke to find John’s hand playing with her grey curls. 

“Hey.” John’s voice was rough but his gaze when it locked with hers was lucid. She smiled widely. 

“Trying to upstage me before my own birthday party?” She kissed his palm. His answering grin was weak, but his eyes told her everything. 

Baeldor had also regained consciousness and nuzzled her temple before plopping his own head down on John’s chest. “Tried to make a break for it there, but there’s no escaping you two!” 

Dreo huffed, as he’d hoped she would, and shifted a little sluggishly into a butterfly to rest on John’s eternally messy hair. // Don’t leave us, we couldn’t bear it if you left us. //

“The doctor’s say you had a mild stroke, but they were able to patch you up.” 

“I married you for your amazing bedside manner, you know?” John tried for a smirk but he was still fatigued. Elizabeth helped prop him up against the pillow and offered him some water.   
“I thought for so long I’d go on the battlefield, thought dying in bed would be a gift. Now I just don’t want it to be over.” 

“We think we can Ascend.” 

HIs hand, returned to her hair, paused for a moment, then resumed slowly carding through her curls. 

“Yeah, we know, we were just afraid to let you go.” 

// We don’t want you going were we can’t follow. //. 

Baeldor had promised to never leave them, and he had kept his word, saved them from Asuras, and been there for them countless times over the years. He would choose Ascension in a heartbeat if they asked it of him. 

They had had a wonderful life. Alexander and Victoria had been blessings they hadn’t expected in their lives. They’d raised them between Earth and Atlantis, and had watched them grow into people they could be proud of. And now their children had children of their own. 

Elizabeth felt a need to see what more there was, what more they could do. To be free of the aches and pains of her aging body, to explore, and to watch over her family. 

And she wanted Dreo with her. From all she had read and seen, she knew that the process of Ascension involved merging with your daemon to achieve a higher level of consciousness. She didn’t want her Daemon to disappear into golden Dust.

But then, they had lived a good life, an amazing life. She would never truly be separated from John and Baeldor. They would always have this little sliver of Life for their own. They had done what they could to better the universe they lived in and to leave a legacy for their children of a world better than they had found it themselves. If John and Baeldor didn’t want to Ascend they would stay with them until the end. Perhaps there was another life after death, who could say? 

They was no need to be afraid, she could let go of all her fears and doubts. Whether they Ascended or not, Life would unfold as it was meant to. 

Dreo smiled at her and cuddled up in her arms. She realized she was, ironically, finally ready to Ascend. 

Elizabeth raised her eyes to meet John’s. 

“Well, if we don’t like it we can always pop our clogs later…”

The four of them were still giggling when the grandkids ran through the infirmary doors. 

~

Elizabeth’s birthday party had been a huge event in the City’s calendar, with everyone in attendance, including a large contingent of diplomats and politicians from Earth and their allies.   
There had been some bittersweet moments when they reunited with their remaining friends from the olden days of Atlantis. Mostly, they were just happy to have a chance to say goodbye to the people they knew and loved. 

~

Elizabeth and John had curled up on their old balcony to look out at the stars. Baeldor was pressed up against John’s side, helping to support him, intently watching Dreo as she shifted into her favorite forms, reliving old memories of their long lives. 

Alexander, Victoria, their spouses and children were arrayed around them, listening and laughing, adding their own remembrances. The children’s daemons played at becoming whatever form Dreo currently held, especially her more fantastical ones, though those with varying success. 

When their stories were ended, Baeldor and Dreoides settled happily into their human’s arms.   
Elizabeth turned to John, 

“Want to join me on another great adventure?” 

He smiled lovingly, and grasped her hand.

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world!”


End file.
